


Watch How Determined

by InnerSpectrum



Series: Mystrade is Our Division Prompts [35]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Facebook: Mystrade is our Division Fic Prompts, Mystrade Prompt Challenge, Mystrade is our Division FB Fic Prompts, mystrade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-15 13:11:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19296424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InnerSpectrum/pseuds/InnerSpectrum
Summary: When Gregory Lestrade is determined to get something he gladly worked for it





	Watch How Determined

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Mystrade is our Division FB Fic Prompts | Watch

Gregory smiled when he heard the ticking sound and the soft grating of the cogwheels. Over time Greg learned to identify the three main ones by sound alone.

It was not the Hamilton 992B in the stainless-steel case.

_No, it’s a weekday and that’s a weekend pocket watch that he'll sometimes wear with one of casual two-piece suits._

It was not the 1910 Omega Chronograph.

_No. He rarely wears it anymore, but he winds it every other day to ensure it still works._

Mycroft picked a pocket watch from the bureau drawer that held all their watches – wrist and pocket.

_Ah, the Daily Grind of course._

The Daily Grind was an 1890 Antique Waltham 14k Gold Hunter Case Pocket Watch on a double Albert watch chain. Mycroft had inherited the watch from his paternal grandfather.

_Still… 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15!_

Mycroft gave the pocket watch its daily windup. It’s the one he wears the most with his suits for work.  He knew it took exactly fifteen turns for fully wind the watch.

_Loop the t bar through the middle buttonhole, button the waistcoat and drape one end of the chain in the right pocket and the watch itself in the left pocket. And turn._

Mycroft turned and faced him. Greg grinned. His husband was indeed a creature of habit in some things.

_You and your fancy pocket watches._

He walked over to the bureau, about to select his regular watch for the day when Mycroft handed him a gift-wrapped box.

"What is this?" Gregory Lestrade looked curiously at the small wrapped box. 

"Funny, I asked that exact question of you once regarding this." his husband of three years, Mycroft Holmes, smiled as enigmatically as ever "Open it and find out."

"I hope it's not what I think it is. I am determined to do it myself one day."

"It's determined today’s not that day. Open it." Mycroft shrugged as enigmatic as always as Greg took the box.

* * *

"What is this?" Mycroft carefully held up a torn magazine page held together in a clear envelope.

Gregory was on his own to pack when he called it quits with his philandering wife. Sherlock's embarrassing announcement at the Christmas get together was the last straw. He didn't want a major confrontation and left her everything but his most personal items. It made it easy to decide whether to keep, donate it or trash it. It was a good thing. It had made his next move simpler when nearly a decade, and after five years of officially dating later, Gregory proposed to Mycroft and to his utter joy the Iceman accepted. Now it was Mycroft helping him keep, donate it or trash.

"Oh that. I always had watches as a kid, but nothing fancy. Amongst others, my favorite was a cheap little Casio, one with the light that didn't seem to work very well because it only lit up on one side. Anyways, you know I'm an East End boy, we didn't have a lot of money. I know I wasn't in A Levels when I stumbled across this magazine. It was full of Breitlings, Chase-Durers, etc. Mostly watches that if I saved for two years were still out of my pay grade. Still I became enamored, especially of a Breitling that became my holy grail."

"Is that why you have that old  Chase-Durer Wing Commander in your jewelry box?" Mycroft looked at the expensive for the time watches on the page. "Your first real watch so to speak?"

"Yeah. I did all sorts of odd jobs and saved up for it, took me almost a year. I was determined to get it. It was a present to myself for acing my A Levels. That watch became a symbol of success for me, you know? Then I had uni and the academy and well, life happened, and I never got the Breitling in fact forgot all about it. That’s still out of this  copper's pay grade. The Chase-Durer broke in academy, but I keep it. It was the first thing that proved to me that despite everything and everyone telling I couldn't, I was still able to get what I wanted by discipline and making my wants a reality. It was my first real lesson in it. It was that determination made me a cop, a sergeant, a DI..."

"It was that determination to make me your reality?" Mycroft added when Greg took the old magazine page from him and added it to the trash pile.

"Yes, but we have each other now. The best times ahead of us can't be determined by a watch." The DI leaned in for a kiss.

"Indeed."

* * *

Because he knew Mycroft expected it, instead ripping the wrapping to shreds to get to the box as he normally would, Greg sat on the edge of the bed and painstakingly opened the wrapper. Mycroft patiently kept straight face and waited out his shenanigans with the paper.

Greg finally unwrapped the box. It was a watch box, which he expected. He had feared Mycroft had gotten him the Breitling. He had wanted to work for it himself, he did not want it as a gift, but it was not a Breitling. Greg looked up in surprise as he realized it was the box from his old broken Chase-Durer Wing Commander.

“No!” He opened the box slowly. It was his old watch. The familiar scratches were all there.

“Yes.” Mycroft countered and sat next to him on the bed.

He ran a finger across it. It was working again. His first real possession. The physical symbol of determination working again. He did not realize how much it meant to see the watch working again until he held it I his hands.

“I know you want to earn the Breitling for yourself. I will not deny you the joy of that success once you do. But reminding you of the joy of the first success. That I could do.” Mycroft smiled at last seeing the joy on Greg’s face.

“Oh! Oh Myc!” He immediately took put the Chase-Durer Wing Commander on his wrist. “Thank you!”

"As a wise man once said to me then: The best times ahead of us can't be determined by a watch." 

"Indeed." Greg grinned as he leaned in for a kiss now as he had then. He licked Mycroft’s lips and began to unhook the pocket watch from Mycroft’s waistcoat.

“What do you think you are doing?” Mycroft returned the licks with a grin.

“Hoping to wind you up.” Greg moved onto opening the buttons of the waistcoat itself. “I’m determined to unwrap you like I did my present.”

“And how determined are you?” Mycroft raised his brow as Greg loosened his tie.

Greg pushed him down on the bed so that the tie remained in his hand. He tossed it aside as he straddled his husband.

“Very.”

**Author's Note:**

> Pipes are occasionally of extraordinary interest...nothing has more individuality save, perhaps, watches and bootlaces." - ACD - Sherlock Holmes – The Yellow Face


End file.
